The Orioles stayed in-house to fill a key role in their baseball operations department.

After losing director of draft operations Brad Ciolek to the Washington Nationals earlier this month, Baltimore on Thursday elevated Matt Blood to oversee the Orioles’ draft operations, among other player development-related duties, amid a flurry of promotions by the club.

Blood, who joined the Orioles in September 2019, has been the organization’s director of player development for the past four years. His new title is vice president of player development and domestic scouting. In addition to overseeing draft operations, he will supervise the Orioles’ player development and scouting operations.

Blood was one of a dozen members of Baltimore’s baseball operations department to be promoted Thursday. Replacing Blood as director of player development is Anthony Villa, who spent the 2023 season as the Orioles’ minor league hitting coordinator, a source with direct knowledge confirmed to The Baltimore Sun. Villa played in the Chicago White Sox’s minor league system from 2016 to 2018 and joined the Orioles as a coach in November 2019. He served as hitting coach for High-A Aberdeen in 2020 and the Orioles’ Florida Complex League team in 2021 before transitioning to the organization’s lower-level hitting coordinator in 2022. MASNSports.com first reported Villa’s promotion.

As Baltimore’s farm director, Blood helped the Orioles’ minor league system become the sport’s best. Baltimore has boasted the No. 1 prospect on Baseball America’s top 100 list entering the previous two seasons with Adley Rutschman and Gunnar Henderson, and 19-year-old Jackson Holliday is currently rated by the publication as the sport’s top prospect. Six Orioles prospects are inside Baseball America’s top 100.

Before joining the Orioles, Blood was director of player development for the Texas Rangers in 2019 and spent the previous three years as director of USA Baseball’s 18 and Under National Team Program. He got his start in professional baseball as an area scout with the St. Louis Cardinals from 2009 to 2015. Orioles executive vice president and general manager Mike Elias joined the Cardinals as a scout in 2007 and was their manager of amateur scouting in 2010, while Baltimore’s vice president and assistant general manager of analytics Sig Mejdal worked in St. Louis’ analytics department from 2005 to 2011.

Ciolek left for Washington after spending more than a decade with the Orioles. He had overseen each of the five drafts since Elias was hired in November 2018. He joined the Nationals as their senior director of amateur scouting, a move Washington publicly announced Wednesday.

Among the other promotions, Koby Perez, one of Elias’ first hires, was elevated from senior director of international scouting to his new title of vice president of international scouting and operations. Mike Snyder, a holdover from the previous regime, was promoted from director of pro scouting to senior director of pro scouting.

The other promotions include: Gerardo Cabrera from Latin American supervisor to director of Latin American scouting; Kevin Carter from senior pro scouting analyst to manager of pro scouting; Hendrik Herz from senior scouting analyst to manager of domestic scouting analysis; Chad Tatum from senior scouting analyst to manager of domestic scouting; Will Robertson from senior pro scouting analyst to special assignment scout; and Alex Tarandek from scouting analyst to senior scouting analyst. Michael Weis was named senior data scientist of draft evaluation, while Maria Arellano was named senior manager of international operations and baseball administration.

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UMass and Army are coming off similar lopsided beatdowns against ranked opponents, but the Minutemen had an extra week to recuperate.

The Minutemen went into the bye week after being blitzed 63-0 by No. 6 Penn State on Oct. 14 at Beaver Stadium. Army suffered a similar fate when it was obliterated 62-0 by No. 15 LSU last Saturday at Tiger Stadium.

Both Independent programs will look to regroup when the Minutemen (1-7) engage the Black Knights of Army (2-5) on Saturday (noon) at Michie Stadium. Army beat UMass 44-7 last season at McGuirk Stadium.

“The good thing is obviously the guys get a chance to recoup in terms of the physical piece,” said UMass head coach Don Brown. “On Monday we reviewed the (Penn State) contest and then moved on to get a jump on Army.

“Sometimes that (bye week) goes in a positive direction and sometimes in a negative direction and there is no predicting it. It all depends on what kind of health you have coming out of the contest and how well you played. Obviously, they ran into the SEC and took on the LSU challenge, not an easy process.”

The Cadets had exclusively run the Flexbone triple option attack for decades but were compelled to install a prostyle multiple offense over the summer. Army and just about every other triple option attack had to make a transition when the NCAA banned the cut block outside the tackle box after the 2022 season.

“Army is a huge deal because they have made a transition in their offensive style so that helped us prepare as well,” said Brown. “They don’t run the triple anymore and we are preparing ourselves for their scheme. All of the triple option teams had to make that adjustment because you can’t cut block.”

Brown feels dual threat quarterback Taisun Phommachanh could be back to full health in time for Army. Phommachanh led UMass to its 41-30 victory at New Mexico State on Aug. 26 but was injured the following week at Auburn.

Phommachanh, a redshirt junior transfer from Clemson, missed the next three games. He started the last three games and, on the season, has completed 73-of-116 passes for 813 yards with three touchdowns and three interceptions.

“He is getting very close,” said Brown. “I can’t say 100 percent but each and every week there has been no setbacks so that has been a positive.”

 

The result was good. The process was bad. That’s what quarterback Kirk Cousins kept going back to after the Vikings upset the San Francisco 49ers on Monday Night Football earlier this week.

There was a particular play before halftime during which Cousins hung in the pocket against a zero blitz, then unleashed a deep pass to rookie receiver Jordan Addison downfield.

It probably should have been intercepted as cornerback Charvarius Ward undercut the throw while it was in the air. Instead, Addison ripped it away from Ward at the last second, kept his balance in the open field, and raced toward the end zone for a 60-yard touchdown. He hit the Michael Jordan shrug as he crossed the goal line for good measure.

“I thought it was getting picked,” Cousins said of the pass. “I still don’t know how Jordan came away with it.”

Looking back on it roughly 48 hours later, as much as Cousins made sure to praise Addison for bailing him out, he couldn’t get over the fact that he put the Vikings in a precarious position.

“I hate watching plays that go our way where I felt like we were fortunate,” Cousins said. “Because I don’t feel we were good enough.”

It’s pretty easy to see why Cousins has repeatedly gone on record saying the game he loves torments him at every turn. You would have a hard time finding a quarterback who is harder on himself than Cousins. He doesn’t like to celebrate if he feels that he wasn’t at his best.

The pursuit of perfection is a blessing and a curse for Cousins, who, at 35 years old, has already played in the NFL for much longer than most predicted.

“I think that self-critique is why I’m still standing here talking in Year 12,” he said. “I also think it’s why sometimes I feel like this game is a grind.”

Though some players can effortlessly turn the page, Cousins obsesses over the minutiae on a weekly basis, regardless of whether the Vikings win or lose.

Never mind that he played out of his mind on Monday Night Football, staring down a menacing defensive front, and completing 35 of 45 passes for 378 yards and a pair of touchdowns. As he reflected on his performance, Cousins found himself thinking about his underthrown pass to Addison. He had trouble letting himself off the hook even if it worked out in his favor.

“From my standpoint, and what I can control, I’m saying, ‘I’ve got to be better,’ ” Cousins said. “There is some level of, ‘We got away with one.’ I don’t love living like that for too long because I don’t feel like it’s sustainable.”

On the flip side, if Cousins feels like he did everything right on a play that doesn’t go his way, he struggles to give himself grace. The duality of his own expectations isn’t lost on him.

“I don’t sleep too well,” he admitted. “You know, I kind of get tormented either way, I guess, which is why it’s tough.”

It hasn’t gotten any easier for Cousins with time as he constantly is trying to be the best version of himself. If star receiver Justin Jefferson has to to slow down for a ball in space, for example, Cousins will pour over it on the sideline afterward, lamenting that his throw didn’t hit his receiver in stride. As far as he’s concerned, there’s always room for improvement.

“You’re never really just going out there and shrugging the shoulders and playing careless,” Cousins said. “You’re playing with so much care that there’s always evaluating and self-critiquing,”

It has been a balancing act for Cousins throughout his career. How does he continue to push himself while also making sure to enjoy the moment? He noted that it helps to have someone like Jefferson as his locker mate at TCO Performance Center.

“He kind helps me see, ‘There’s another approach to it,’ ” Cousins said. “You can just kind of go out there and have fun.”

That was on display while Cousins was conducting a postgame interview with ESPN on Monday. As he answered questions, Cousins got interrupted by Jefferson racing in to place a chain around his neck in celebration. It provided a few seconds of pure joy from Cousins as he got to bask in leading the Vikings to a big win.

“There’s honestly more relief when we win,” Cousins said. “You want to get to a place where it’s not just relief.”

The pursuit of perfection continues.

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